


Reid and Curtis

by RoughDraftHero



Category: Original Work, The Sentinel
Genre: Dom/sub, Dubious Consent, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Marking, One Shot, Sentinel/Guide Bonding, Time Skips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-12
Updated: 2017-05-12
Packaged: 2018-10-30 21:54:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,462
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10885677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoughDraftHero/pseuds/RoughDraftHero
Summary: Reid and Curtis are best friends, and stay best friends even after Curtis becomes a guide.(An original Sentinel oneshot)





	Reid and Curtis

This starts with a dream. Well no, not a dream—it’s a memory. It happened. And now Curtis, asleep, was reliving this memory.

First off, before the memory: Curtis was sleeping in the cab of his rig. The rig was parked beneath a freeway overpass somewhere between Fresno and Monterey, and wouldn’t have to go any closer to one place or the other for at least five hours because Curtis had hauled ass through Nevada. He wasn’t thinking about that though, because he was asleep dreaming of his memory.

He was thirteen years old, and had no idea how to drive then (that’s a lie). He wasn’t allowed to drive. Rules, however, were meant to be broken by thirteen year olds and their best friends. In this case, Curtis’s best friend was Reid, who, at the time, wasn’t cool. Yet. Reid was shorter and bonier than Curtis, and a year younger. He was from “the right side of the tracks,” even though there weren’t any tracks in their town. He was rich. (His parents were rich). It didn’t matter. 

Although, they probably should have weighed the consequences of taking Curtis’s mom’s twenty-year old buick out on the road versus taking one of Reid’s dad’s many cars that he couldn’t care less about. Curtis and Reid didn’t know enough, weren’t old enough, and weren’t empathetic enough to realize which car held the most value. Needless to say, they were typical thirteen year old boys. 

First they drove to the quarry but there is literally nothing interesting about quarries, so they drove to the 7-11 and bought soda. Neither mentioned doing something truly daring, like bribing the bored, pockmarked teenager behind the counter into selling them beer, even though in both their imaginations (and when they told the story later), they did. 

Summer was meant for that sort of thing.

It was Reid who suggested driving to what passed for a makeout spot next. Curtis was only slightly dubious—they didn’t have any girls, and only had each other. Wasn’t that weird? Reid assured him they were doing it for a laugh. They would throws eggs at the other teenagers’ cars.

_ We don’t have eggs,  _ Curtis thought as he navigated up the cracked, uneven paved road that lead to an overlook where anyone could see the entire town laid out before them, if they wanted to. 

“Pull in over there,” Reid said, slightly breathless. He had his nose pressed against the passenger door window, as if that would make it any easier spotting the people inside the other cars. Curtis just followed orders, turning the rumbling Buick into a space just slightly apart from the next car over. When he switched the engine off, and the headlights went out, he and Reid were enveloped in a warm darkness. Just barely, if they listened hard, they could hear giggling.

Reid was still ogling everything outside with his pale hands splayed flat against the window, and in the moonlight, Curtis could see the freckles on Reid’s knuckles. His red hair curled around his ears, messy as always, and the shorts he was wearing seemed to blatantly say,  _ look here, this rich kid has knobby knees.  _ They were still bruised.

Curtis frowned. “I wish I’d punched Gregor’s face in.”

“Me too. That I’d punched him, I mean.” Reid dropped in his seat with a huff. “But he had his brother and them down the street, didn’t you see?”

“Yeah.”

“And I heard they told everyone that my dad called their dad. Just great!” 

Curtis half smiled. He knew how much Reid hated his dad interfering with kids’ stuff. If any of the parents caught wind of their kids making fun of Reid, they put an end to it immediately.  _ That’s  _ how rich Reid’s family was. Truthfully, they owned the factories outside of town, but also, and more importantly, Reid’s dad was the town’s sentinel. 

Because of that, Curtis’s kneejerk reaction was to defend Mr. Cullers but when he opened his mouth, he felt a slight click in his head and then a shot of pain. “Ouch,” was all he said.

Curtis swayed, and then,  _ oh boy _ later he would say it was like being drunk! But if he’d known any better, he would have known it was like flying high on shrooms. Glued to the vinyl seat, he could only stare blankly at the stars above as every happy, sad, hormonal emotion—the cry of a boy burying himself in a girl for the first time, the laugh of a girl as she felt something new and thrilling spring up from her curled toes, the gasps as young people explored each other—swept through Curtis like the ghost of teenagers past. 

#

The CB radio in Curtis’s rig had an 11-mile range. This was pretty fancy, and he’d invested in the stronger antenna once he realized how much he liked yacking with the other road warriors. Or maybe it was because he'd gotten lonely.

He didn’t have Reid sitting next to him here.

Of the truckers he talked to, he had favorites and made friends, which ultimately was his undoing, not that he knew that then. He’d made other mistakes of course, some seemingly easy to have avoided, such as driving routes close to his home state, but he honestly thought making friends was fine. He bought the antenna so he could speak to those truckers for as long as possible.

It was Minnie Mouse, she of the inscrutable southern accent, who mentioned (offhand) that a man was looking for Curtis. 

Did she say this just as that 11-mile range met its end? Yes, she did. And Curtis was left with a cold stone in his gut while his hands tremored on the wheel. 

#

Dreaming about Reid, and that first night, had of course brought up other memories.

It was all because of Reid. 

Without him, Curtis would have been caught. For sure. 

“Only my dad can sense you,” he told Curtis. “So you just have to avoid him.” They were lucky it was a one-sentinel kind of town. Mr. Cullers was so busy that he barely noticed when Curtis stopped coming around, but Reid talked about him so much that no one doubted the friendship anyway. 

Of course, there were still the yearly spit test at school when some wonk in a suit showed up with about five million cotton swabs and had all the kids line up one by one. The first time— _ after— _ Curtis wanted to stay home, but Reid convinced him to come. 

When the wonk reached him, the school fire alarm went off. Curtis felt someone tug at his arm, and there was Reid, green eyes lit with mischief, holding out a cotton swab. He squeezed Curtis’s wrist before darting away. 

It took another five minutes for everything to settle down.

“Hm,” was all the wonk said after wiping the swab across some kinda chemical sheet. The cotton had turned blue. He moved on to the next kid. 

It was kinda funny how no one noticed the fire alarm went off two years in a row, and that it always happened right when Curtis was about to take the swab. He and Reid would laugh about it as they walked down main street, celebratory ice cream cones in their hands, melting ice cream dripping down their fingers. “And that guy was bored as hell,” Curtis said, licking his thumb. “If he’d caught a guide, he woulda lit up like a firecracker. I owe you one.”

Was that too cheesy? Reid hadn’t said anything, so Curtis glanced at him. “Oh—uh yeah,” Reid barked, his newly deeper voice cracking slightly as he whipped his face forward when Curtis looked at him. There was a slight tinge of red on his freckled cheeks. “But did you really sense how bored that guy was?”

“Yeah.” The Center wonk felt like a soggy piece of bread inside, or someone who needed to feel the summer breeze across his face as he crested over a hill on a flashy new ten-speed. 

“Do you sense everyone?”

“Well—”

“Sugs?” 

Curtis blinked, thrown off by the sudden mention of the senior baseball player he rooted for at saturday games. No other kid at Midberry High could play like Sugs. When he passed by Curtis in the hallways, with his crisp letterman jacket on and a girl under his arm, he felt like a home run.

“I guess,” Curtis said.

“Well, whatever.” Curtis didn’t know what they were  _ whatever-ing  _ from, so he just didn’t speak. Reid said, “Sugs is graduating this year.”

“Yeah, I know.”

They’d reached their favorite bench, the bus bench across the street from a foreign auto body repair shop where they could watch German and Italian cars be worked on all afternoon until it was time to go home for dinner. 

Reid was shielding his eyes against the sun, hunched over as he licked his ice cream. Curtis didn’t know how to ask something that had been on his mind for a couple of weeks, didn’t know if he wanted to ask it, but with every little wince that shook through Reid’s body, Curtis knew it was time.

“What’d your dad want to talk about the other day? When he called you home.”

Reid went very still. And inside him, well just beneath his skin, was a coiled secret, something Curtis couldn’t even give description to. 

“You better not flip out,” Reid said. 

“I won’t.”

“I mean it! I’ll kick your ass if you flip on me.”

“I promise I won’t.”

Reid sighed a deep sigh, like a little kid’s sigh rather than a fifteen year old’s. “I have your back, no matter what Curtis, I have your back, and this won’t change anything, okay? But yeah, turns out I’m a sentinel and I presented last week—you know, when I had that seizure.”

Curtis didn’t want to think about the day Reid collapsed at school. He wanted to rub ice on the sunburn he felt inside of Reid. Without really meaning too, he cupped his palm around the back of Reid’s neck. 

His own inside reaction was lost because all he could focus on was Reid’s sudden melting into his touch, his head dropping back so that his curly red hair tickled along Curtis’s fingers. 

“Shit, that feels so good,” Reid murmured. He added: “So… it doesn’t bother you?”

“Does this mean you’re leaving?”

Reid jerked away, eyebrows furrowed as he stared at Curtis, searching. Then he seemed to relax. “You don’t want me to leave.”

“Well yeah,” Curtis laughed. 

Nodding, Reid sat back, and then glanced at Curtis’s hand, which reminded him of when his mom’s cat expected more petting after Curtis had stopped. So he put his palm back on Reid’s neck. Reid’s eyelids drooped and he smiled. “You’re good at that.”

Curtis was distracted parsing the weird jolt in his belly when Reid had looked at him before; looked at him like he might hit Curtis. Hit? That wasn’t right. Like he was going to tackle Curtis. Or something. Reid’s flash of irritation had been incandescent.

Even now, with palm to neck, Curtis could feel something pulsing in Reid—a deep thrum that reverberated through his body.

He pulled back. 

Reid noticed, clearly, and frowned. But he didn’t say anything. “Anyway, this will just make hiding you easier, until it’s time. They’ll be so focused on me and what I want that they won’t care about looking for a guide. A born and raised sentinel right in town!” he finished bitterly, like he had anything to be bitter about.

Then he glanced down at his arm, idly rubbing his bicep with a distant smile on his face. Curtis immediately noted the defined muscle, more defined than even a few months ago. Also, Reid was getting taller. He’d pass Curtis in no time. 

These changes, at first, had been nothing. Just a flash in the pan. But now they were starting to add up to something that made Curtis feel antsy. But that was fine, just Curtis being anxious Curtis. Reid had his back and their friendship could withstand anything.

#

Curtis pulled into a McDonald's.

He was shaking.  _ A man is looking for you,  _ she had said. And he didn’t need to guess who. There was only one man in the world who would be looking for him. Although it was hard to think of Reid as a man rather than a boy, in fact Curtis couldn’t even picture it. 

What did that even mean, too? How could Reid look for him? Did he have Curtis’s new last name? Did he have his route? And why was Curtis’s heart thudding with anticipation? (Idiot.)

Almost fifteen years they hadn’t seen each other. Curtis had planned for it to be a hundred. 

“Fuck,” he said.

And then the CB crackled. “Curtis?”

His heart skipped a damn beat. He stared at the radio, eyes wide, unbelieving. That was Reid’s voice coming out of Curtis’s fancy 11-mile range CB radio.

_ Damn.  _ Eleven damn miles. He glanced out the window on instinct, not even knowing what he was looking for.

“Curtis,” Reid said again. “Answer me.” 

Even distorted through radio waves, his voice was as familiar as a sarsaparilla soda from the novelty general store back home, which they’d partake of whenever their allowances allowed it so they could pretend to be cowboys.

Curtis reached for the receiver, hand shaking.

Another crackle and Reid spoke. “Well, whatever. Just know I’m not far off, and this stupid thing you’re doing is over  _ tonight _ .”

And that was it. Only, there was more: Curtis’s whole body wanted to fly right over to wherever Reid was, like it could possibly find him and possibly squash the laws gravity in its pursuit.  _ Sentinel,  _ it sang with delight,  _ your sentinel is calling you! _

Curtis never sang. He hummed sometimes. So this bothered him a great deal. He stared out the window, lips pressed tight, until he came to a plan. He’d just have to go off-course, drive up and down some random freeway until his trail was cold. 

The singing ended as he turned the engine on, but his body had something new to whistle:  _ Now you’re gonna be hunted. Moron.  _

#

A lot of Reid’s scheme to keep Curtis’s status under wraps seemed to involve lolling about Curtis’s room, reading comics. Also, constantly touching.

One afternoon, Reid had knocked Curtis over on his bed, and then straddled him. As he pushed Curtis’s shirt up, his eyes seemed to darken. “My dad thinks I’m some kinda super sentinel who doesn’t need a guide,” he said, his voice oddly filled with self-satisfaction. He fanned his fingers wide across Curtis’s chest, his eyes going even darker. 

This was… normal. According to Reid. He told Curtis that since they were a guide and a sentinel, they could just help each other and everything would work out. However, Curtis was less sure of how normal Reid’s constantly pinning him down and removing half his clothes was. It didn’t seem very normal. 

“Curtis.” Reid’s voice was tight with frustration.

He didn’t need to say anything else. Curtis could feel, right down to his toes, that Reid wanted more than just a prone body lying beneath him. He wanted Curtis to reach up, to touch him back, to make the circle of connection pure and complete. 

But Curtis wasn’t sure he wanted to do that. He’d thought about it, of these afternoons spent together, and he believed touching Reid back would start something that neither of them could stop. 

After a day of watching Reid (wearing a crisp letterman jacket) hang out with his new friends in the hallway, Curtis didn’t mind being taken here to his own room, having his shirt tugged off and his body pinned down. Having Reid looming over him. But he was scared.

He was scared every time Reid casually mentioned how he’d been reading up on sentinel-guide bonding. He was scared every time Reid seemed to show up wherever Curtis went without him, but didn’t say anything about it. He was scared of how his and Reid’s secrets were starting to become separate things entirely.

The thing was, Curtis had been reading too. He’d been reading about the lives of guides. 

“Wanna see something I learned at the Center?” Reid asked him, hands pressing down on Curtis’s shoulders as if to draw his attention back. 

Curtis nodded and Reid leaned in close, face tucking against Curtis’s throat, and breathed in. He sat up. “I could tell you the exact time, down to the second, that soon-to-be-dead fucking dipshit at the gas station tried to neck with you this morning.”

_ Tried  _ was the right word. Reid had come in with his fist so fast that Curtis could still feel the heat of the gas station attendant’s lips on his skin while the guy lay punched out on the sticky ground. 

“Why haven’t you ever…” Reid trailed off. “Well you know, tried that stuff with me?”

Curtis swallowed, unsure of how to voice his fears.

“Did I do something wrong that time, Curtis? Did I hurt you?”

Oh right, he was talking about that night three years ago when Curtis had been slammed with every horny teenager’s burning passion and he thought he was gonna die, that his own dick was gonna kill him. Reid had, um, taken care of that. They never talked about it again.

The questions Reid asked weren’t plaintive. They both knew the answer: no, he hadn’t hurt Curtis. He asked as if to cement his position, as if to say, it’s about time you put out, huh?

Probably most teenagers don’t have this problem, but Curtis was reeling. He never knew there was a difference between a best friend looking at him like  _ we should go play horseshoes by the lake _ and  _ you should get on your belly for me.  _ But, apparently, there was a difference. And now Curtis was staring that difference in the eye.

If he let Reid do what he wanted to do, their lives would also be different. A vast change that Curtis couldn’t even imagine would wash over everything and they wouldn’t hang out at the bus stop watching cars being worked on ever again. They wouldn’t shoot the shit at the general store. They wouldn’t be who they were, but of course they weren’t that anyway. 

“You’re killing me,” Reid said.

Maybe because of these things that had changed (that had changed so quickly), he couldn’t see the decision solidify in Curtis’s eyes. They were both still so young, and new to what they were, that Reid couldn’t read the warning blaring at him through their nascent connection.

Curtis, years later, often wondered what Reid would have done if he could have. 

#

He pulled into a rest stop about two hundred miles from where he was when Reid spoke to him through the CB. It was past evening by then, and his was the only rig in the lot dedicated to truckers.

This was a forested area, and trees lined the freeway, blocking the rest stop from view. He thought he might be able to catch a wink here, but instead he sat in the driver’s seat and peered out at the darkness, arms folded over his chest.

He remembered everything. He remembered saying goodbye to Reid that afternoon and then pulling a duffle bag from his closet. He remembered the frantic explanation he gave to his mother, her handing him all the cash she had, and then leaving.  _ Why am I doing this?  _ That question remained with him for a long, long time. 

Reid was so important to him. Always had been. When Reid was a redheaded shrimp, when he got big and strong, and every second in between, he’d been the center of Curtis’s world. In fact, if someone had asked Curtis whether he minded binding himself to Reid’s whims for the rest of his life, would he be able to do it? —He’d say no, hell no. 

So why? Why leave his mom and his home to spend so many lonely days and years in this truck? Why become anonymous to the world? Because that was a choice he got to make, probably. At least, that’s what he kept telling himself. 

In the hazy, half-asleep pile of thoughts he was dealing with, Curtis almost didn’t catch the slight shift in light across the lot. He sat up immediately.

There it was—a movement in the darkness. His doors were already locked, but he turned the headlights on. Nothing.But he heard, no felt, something. He definitely heard footsteps somewhere beside the rig; the sliding of a flat palm against the metal shell. All at once, Curtis felt  _ lust.  _

Blood lust. Passion lust. Hunt lust. 

He knew what it was, having seen the news stories and read some books on sentinels. But he’d never felt its potency. Overheated, sweating, he undid the top button of his shirt. 

There was a low moan, then a chuckle. “Oh, Curtis. You teasing me?”

His hand tremored on the button. His other hand… he cupped himself, teeth gritted at how hard he was. He had no idea where Reid was standing. The hair on his arms stood on end.

This time, there was a growl. Something slammed against the side of the rig and Curtis jumped. He watched, paralyzed as Reid came into view of the headlights.

He was a grown man, now, his shoulders broad and his red hair styled. Unlike Curtis, who was generally unkempt, this Reid wore his money and power well. His throat was long and lean (and so was the rest of his body), any hint of that knobby boy Curtis knew was gone. He stared straight at Curtis, straight into him with those green eyes, and smirked.

Curtis knocked his door open and ran for it. 

The triumphant roar behind him was like flames being held to his feet. If he could just make it to the gas station across the freeway— 

Reid full-body slammed him to the cement. 

Grunting, Curtis tried to elbow him away, but it was useless. A hand locked around the back of his neck, and Reid sat securely on top of him, breathing just fine while Curtis huffed and puffed. 

If Curtis had expected any kind of catch-up or long talk, he was clearly mistaken. There was something animalistic about the way Reid pressed himself down along Curtis, mouthing the back of his neck while pressing a rather imminent hardon against Curtis’s ass.

Maybe the panic needed to wear off, because slowly Curtis became aware of more than just the physical sensation of Reid dominating him, pressing his cheek down on cement still warm from the day. A rush of emotions seeped into him, foremost Reid’s utter need to penetrate Curtis in any way he could--by teeth, fingers, or cock. 

“Jesus,” Curtis muttered. 

Reid nuzzled him, and tugged at his shirt just like how he had when they were teenagers, and Curtis gave way just like he had when they were teenagers. He could tell this was different. Reid wasn’t really Reid at the moment, or he was it his most desperate sentinel. 

He just pressed his face flat down on Curtis’s back and inhaled, hands tenderly clutching at Curtis’s sides. He made a low rumbling sound. Reid was warring with himself, Curtis could tell. He was struggling against the bonding frenzy, but he wouldn’t win.

“It’s okay,” Curtis said, because he couldn’t bare the thought of Reid hating himself. “I want it, I do. I promise.”

And that was how Curtis ended up fucked and bonded in the middle of a dark parking lot, bits of concrete digging into his palms and knees as he gasped his way through the unflagging, unyielding demands Ried made of his body—and later his soul. 

He wasn’t sure what happened first, the bond or him cumming like a firehose. But the guide bit of him was thrilled, wrapping itself around Reid’s pain and wounds, soothing him and dimming the sharpness of the world. This only seemed to make Reid hornier, of course. 

Curtis was out of it. He was almost happy to let Reid fold him in half, knees almost to his chest, and shove a hard cock into him again. He just dropped his head back, exposing his throat, and let out breathy yelps until he was too tired to do even that. 

Fucked out the way he was, he barely felt Reid bite between throat and shoulder.  

#

The truck was rumbling around him when he woke up in the passenger’s seat. A blanket was wrapped tightly around him. Reid was driving.

“Uh—” Curtis said, voice scratchy. 

“You gotta make this delivery, right?” Reid asked, lip quirked. 

“Yeah.” There was even a steaming cup of coffee waiting in the holder on his side. Slowly, with a wince, Curtis reached for it. His entire body ached. But man, he could  _ feel  _ Reid. He could feel Reid’s joy tinged with a little bit of apprehension.  _ Me too,  _ he wanted to say.

After a long moment, Reid spoke. “Here’s the thing, Curtis. We’re bonded now.”

“Yeah.”

“And what’s done is done, so, let’s not talk about these fifteen years.”

“Right.” They didn’t need to. Curtis knew now the pain Reid had been through. 

“Well I will say one thing—it sucked knowing you thought I’d just let you take off like that.” Reid was smiling, his green eyes light.

Curtis stared at him. “I didn’t know what you’d do.”

“Well it took me longer than I’d hoped, but fair to say you’ve had a good chunk of time to yourself? You fucked a couple of boys too, don’t think I don’t know about that.” 

He was only half-smiling now and Curtis chuckled. Then he sobered. “But you’re saying time’s up.”

“That’s right.”

“No more running.”

“Right, Curtis. Door’s closed, ship’s left the dock. We’re not just friends anymore, you’re my guide. I—god this sounds dumb—but I call the shots. ”

Curtis looked off a bit into the distance, a faint smile on his face. “Well you already did that anyway.”

A gentle hand brushed down his hair, and cupped at the back of his neck. He met Reid’s gaze. Reid didn’t say anything, but his point was clear: He was  _ dead serious _ about Curtis, enough to hunt him down for more than a decade. 

He’d have to teach Curtis how to let go of their friendship; to be so goddamn sure about this changed thing between them where Reid was sentinel and Curtis was guide, because Curtis wasn’t there yet. But he trusted Reid, so he supposed it would happen someday.  


End file.
